2017 News

Latest News

Unsolved Problems in Hydrology - Join the Conversation

In November 2017 IAHS launched the new initiative to generate the 23 unsolved problems in Hydrology that would revolutionise research in the 21st century with a YouTube video.

The generation of questions is open to everyone and will be distilled through discussion on the IAHS LinkedIn group https://www.linkedin.com/groups/13552921 We aim to finalise the questions in Spring 2018.

We already have entries over a wide range of topics with draft questions and comments including:

Can we trade space for time in hydrology? By Ross Woods

How can we identify the independent factors determining a nonlinearly evolving hydrologic response? By Elena Volpi on behalf of ICSH – STAHY Commission

How can one identify the optimal sample dimension to use in multivariate analysis with copula functions? By Elena Volpi on behalf of ICSH – STAHY Commission

How can we detect and attribute change in flood characteristics? By Elena Volpi on behalf of ICSH - STAHY Commission

Sudden and abrupt changes of water management conditions? By Andreas Schumann

Natural heterogeneity, thermodynamics and (yet again) closing the water balance, by Markus Hrachowitz

Why do we see long term cycles in temperature, rainfall and river flows? By Alberto Montanari

Is it possible to remove the independence condition in the multivariate frequency analysis (e.g., when using Copulas)? By Salvatore Grimaldi

Closing the mass-age balance by measurement by Wouter Berghuijs

What controls the long term water balance, apart from aridity? By Ross Woods

How to determine the snow water equivalent in mountain regions? By Simon Gascoin

What is the value of soil moisture observations for hydrologic predictions? By Luca Brocca

Feel free to add your own draft question or add a comment to the existing discussion on the group.

Help us identify hotspots around the world by filling in the attached questionnaire!(It takes only 5-10 minutes)

This Panta Rhei Survey is a step towards a community-wide effort to share data and advance our understanding of social, technical and hydrological factors underlying the emergence of different phenomena.

If you are at the AGU Conference, please pass by our Interactive Poster on Thursday Morning. We can have a chat, and you can take part to our Survey directly there!

Water and Society: Water Resources Management and Policy in a Changing World (H31O, H33H, H32G)

Also, the Panta Rhei session information is now available for EGU 2018 (Vienna, Austria, 8-13 April 2018). Please consider submitting to these sessions! Support application deadline is 1 December 2017 and abstract submission by 10 January 2018.

What are the 23 unsolved problems in Hydrology that would revolutionise research in the 21st century?

At the IAHS Scientific Assembly in Port Elizabeth in July 2017 the new President of IAHS, Günter Blöschl, outlined his vision for a new initiative to generate a list of unsolved problems in hydrology.

Progress in hydrology is currently hampered by the rather fragmented research and we need stronger harmonisation of research efforts. At the beginning of the 20th Century, mathematician David Hilbert set out 23 unsolved mathematical problems which have greatly stimulated focused research in mathematics and we can use this as a model for the IAHS initiative.

IAHS will facilitate the compilation of a list of unsolved scientific problems in hydrology to revolutionise research in the 21st Century and raise the level of excitement for the science. To make tangible progress, the problems should

(1) ideally relate to observed phenomena and why they happen;

(2) they should be universal (i.e. not only apply to one catchment or region); and

During Winter 2017/2018 we will discuss the procedures for selecting the most important problems and come up with a short list of problems. In April 2018, we will meet to make a final selection based on the discussion outcomes. That meeting is open to all hydrologists.

Once established, the list will be used within IAHS to align symposia planning and other events. It can of course also be used by everybody in hydrology for supporting project proposals and more generally conducting focused research. The vision is for the list of unsolved problems in hydrology to better link hydrological research around the world, and to make more tangible, coherent progress in hydrology.

Nominations for the Prize are made by National Committees to IAHS, National Committees to the UNESCO-IHP or National Hydrological Advisors to the WMO, and forwarded to the Secretary General of IAHS for consideration by the Nomination Committee. The Committee consists of the President and a Vice-President of IAHS and representatives of UNESCO and WMO.

Two medals are awarded under the International Hydrology Prize: the Dooge medal and the Volker medal. Both medals are intended to distinguish outstanding achievements by hydrological scientists but with a different focus. The Dooge medal is aimed at fundamental contributions to the science of hydrology, whereas the Volker medal is aimed at outstanding applications of hydrological science for the benefit of society at large.

The following applies to both the Dooge and Volker medals

The International Hydrology Prize shall be awarded to persons who have made outstanding contributions to hydrology such as confers on the candidate universal recognition of his or her international stature.

The contribution should have an identifiable international dimension extending beyond both the country of normal work and the specific field of interest of the candidate.

The medals may be awarded to hydrologists of long international standing or to younger but active hydrologists who exhibit qualities of international leadership in the science or practice of hydrology.

An active involvement in the work of IAHS and other international organizations in the field of hydrology should be counted as an advantage.

Specific considerations for the Dooge medal

The Dooge medal is particularly intended for hydrologists who have demonstrated scientific excellence, and have made fundamental contributions to the science of hydrology as evidenced by publications in the international scientific literature and other evidence of high standard.

Preference should be given to candidates who have recently exhibited outstanding international leadership in the science of hydrology.

Specific considerations for the Volker medal

The Volker medal is dedicated for hydrologists who have applied their research and hydrological expertise to the benefit of society, addressing issues of public interest and development.

Applications of hydrology to the benefit of developing countries would count as an advantage.

Preference should be given to candidates who have contributed through both scientific and practical work, and who have made outstanding contributions to the Hydrology community as demonstrated by active involvement in the work of IAHS or other international hydrological associations.

Nomination format and procedure

Nominations should be received by the Secretary General of IAHS no later than 31 December 2017 – Christophe Cudennec at cudennec@agrocampus-ouest.fr – and consist of:

a (max. 2, pages A4 format) nomination letter signed by a National Representative to IAHS, the President of a national committee of UNESCO-IHP, or a National Hydrological Advisor to the WMO, with one sentence citation (max. 200 characters), and stating why the nominee is the most qualified person to receive the Volker or Dooge medal, paying attention to the medal's dedication specified above;

the nominee’s CV (max. 3 pages, A4 format) with an emphasis on the contribution to hydrological science and international scientific cooperation, providing clear information on the main criteria used for the evaluation and the specific considerations mentioned above.

a list of the major scientific publications (max. 2 pages, A4 format).

Nominations are expected from the world diversity, and equally for female and male candidates.

Evaluation criteria

a) Outstanding contributions to hydrology evidenced by universal recognition of his or her international stature.

b) Identifiable contributions with international dimensions extending beyond both the country of normal work and the specific field of interest of the candidate.

c) For senior candidates prove of Hydrologists activities of long international standing, or for younger candidates, prove of being active hydrologists with qualities of international leadership in the science or practice of hydrology.

d) Active involvement in the work of IAHS and other international organizations in the field of hydrology is counted as an advantage.

e) Application of the hydrological research performed and the use of his/her expertise to the benefit of society and addressing issues of public interest and development.

f) Applications of hydrology to the benefit of developing countries counts as an advantage.

Two new opinion papers have been added to the Panta Rhei Virtual Series in Hydrological Sciences Journal bringing the number of papers to eight. All papers in the series are currently free to view online.

Beijing IAHS - 13-15 June 2018

Innovative Water Resources Management under Changing Environment - Understanding Interactions and Making Balance between Humankind and Nature

Dear friends and colleagues,

For the second time the International Water Resources Management conference of IAHS will take place in the P.R. of China. We are very pleased that Professor Zongxue Xu, a vice-president of our commission, from the College of Water Sciences of the Beijing Normal University will be our host between the 13th and 15th June 2018.

The main topics of the conference are water management issues with regard to the sustainability of the environment:

Ecological baseflow /Environmental flow to maintain the health of rivers and lakes

Water needs for a healthy society

Interactions between water resources and ecosystem

The program contains also the classical problems of water management:

Assessment of available water resources at regional and basin scales

Socio-hydrology as the basis of water resources management

Water resources allocation and management models

Impact of climate change and human activities on water resources

Risk analysis for water resources systems, and

Spatiotemporal distribution of water resources availability

In this way, the program is wide spreaded and offers many opportunities to present and discuss new scientific results and their practical applications. You are cordially invited to take part in this meeting and to submit an abstract: http://iwrm2018.bnu.edu.cn/

Please note that the deadline for abstract submissions has been extended until September 30th 2017!

Innovation in Hydrometry – from ideas to operation

The workshop will be held in Geneva at WMO headquarters on December 4th and 5th 2017.

Sensing the hydrological cycle is key to understand natural processes. However, the monitoring systems currently operated by National Hydrological Services are very expensive to install and maintain. Too expensive for some applications, such as capacity development efforts in low-income countries. Limited budgets in developing countries but also shrinking budgets in developed countries put pressure on manufacturers and customers of hydrometry equipment to find more cost-effective solutions. MOXXI and HydroHub jointly address the need for increased data quality, spatial/temporal resolution and availability of hydrological observations by resorting to innovation and multidisciplinary.

Three days will be dedicated to Hydrometry basics, field and classroom exercises and recent advances (technology and uncertainty analysis), by internationally recognized lecturers. The audience will be students and professional field hydrologists. The three first courses were held in Brescia (Italy, 2011), Andong (Korea, 2013) and Hanoi (Vietnam, 2014).

IAHS are pleased to be a partner in the upcoming 18th WaterNet/WARFSA/GWP-SA Symposium.

The 18th WaterNet/WARFSA/GWP-SA Symposium will be held in Swakopmund, Namibia from 25th – 27th October 2017 under the theme Integrated Water Resources Development and Management: Innovative Technological Advances for Water Security in Eastern and Southern Africa. The Namibian Ministry of Agriculture, Water and Forestry is the lead host of the 18th Symposium.

The Symposia have been held annually in the Eastern and Southern African regions for the past 17 years to promote interaction among policymakers, academics, practitioners from water and related sectors, and cooperating partners. Together, they identify regional issues, gaps and priorities that require further research and support. Great emphasis will be placed on integration of knowledge, particularly involving scholars form the natural and social sciences.

This year, the sub-themes of the symposium have been aligned to those of the SADC Research Agenda under the Regional Strategic Action Plan on the Integrated Water Resources development and Management Phase IV. It is intended that researchers identify themes under which their projects fit within the SADC Research agenda, and thereby contribute to its main objective which is:

Promoting evidence-based implementation of SADC water programmes and projects through multi- and inter-disciplinary research, and synthesis of existing and new information, which will lead to a realisation of SADC developmental goals.

It is with great sadness that we report the sudden and untimely death of Professor Wayne Erskine who passed away in Darwin in late July 2017.

Wayne graduated with a Doctor of Philosophy in Fluvial Geomorphology (1987) from the University of New South Wales, Australia. He held academic positions at the University of New South Wales, University of Newcastle – Ourimbah Campus and Charles Darwin University and, also, research scientist positions with New South Wales Department of Water Resources, New South Wales State Forest, Office of the Supervising Scientist (OSS), and the Environmental Institute of the Supervising Scientist (ERISS). He had recently been appointed as the sub-editor of Geographical Research. Wayne was a keen fisherman and spoke often of his obsession for everything related to freshwater science.

Wayne was an exceptionally productive and influential fluvial geomorphologist publishing over 230 peer reviewed international and national journal manuscripts, conference papers and book chapters. He supervised 35 post graduate students. Wayne had been a strong supporter of, and contributor to, ICCE activities since the mid-1980s and will be warmly remembered for his in depth and wide readership of the scientific literature which permitted him to engage in detail with all scientists on their work, his ability to produce high quality papers for the Red Book series, his extremely engaging and word perfect presentations on diverse subjects and increasingly on work bridging pure and applied science, and his capacity to ask incisive questions at conferences backed up by his broad, but in-depth, knowledge and understanding. He had recently been discussing the possibility of hosting a future ICCE meeting with the current committee. Wayne will be greatly missed and is survived by three children - Vanessa, Aaron, Jessica and his Mother Judith.

Water System Knowledge Innovation and its Practices in Developing Countries

November 20-22, 2017 Gorgan, Iran

This international conference aims to bring together scientists (in particular from developing countries) and various disciplines that share a common interest in addressing the challenges of understanding and managing water systems.

A special session will be held on the Caspian Sea water-related management challenges to provide a forum for more detailed discussion on an important water system and its dynamics. A one-day field trip will be organized to the southern coastal areas of the Caspian Sea and the nearby Hyrcanian forests.

The broad aims are to enhance the contribution of strategic scientific and technical research and innovation to the sustainable management of water systems, including rivers, groundwater and wetlands.

There are four main objectives for this conference:

(1) To understand major water system problems and their root causes particularly in developing countries in coupled nature-human systems;

(2) To demonstrate current hydrological knowledge of models, tools and case studies to deal with water system problems e.g. water scarcity, water-related disasters, groundwater depletion, water-related poverty and conflicts;

(3) To identify demand for hydrological innovation to meet the grand water system challenges particularly IWM under the severe climate change conditions as well as under unstable policy and management conditions; and

(4) To develop a multi-national and multi-disciplinary cooperation framework with a concrete working plan in order to provide capacity building, monitoring equipments, and free software packages and decision support systems for developing countries, and to expand Panta Rhei as well as IAHS through establishing national committees and regional networks and increasing members in these counties.

Registration fees and logistics

No registration fees will be charged, but participants are responsible for their own international flights. Conference organizers will arrange for accommodation and travelling within Iran.

Key deadlines

June 9, 2017 First announcement of the conferenceAugust 14, 2017 Second announcement of the conferenceSeptember 8, 2017 Deadline for collecting submissionsOctober 31, 2017 Last announcement with detailed conference informationNovember 20-22, 2017 Conference and excursion

The IAHS Tison Award, established in 1982, aims to promote excellence in research by young hydrologists. The Award is granted for an outstanding paper published by IAHS in a period of two years previous to the deadline for nominations.

Awarded during the IAHS2017 Scientific Assembly in Port Elizabeth, South Africa (13th July 2017).

The International Hydrology Prize is awarded annually by IAHS, with UNESCO and WMO, to two people who have made an outstanding contribution to hydrological science.

Nominations for the Prize are made by National Committees to IAHS, National Committees to the UNESCO-IHP or National Hydrological Advisors to the WMO, and forwarded to the Secretary General of IAHS for consideration by the Nomination Committee. The Committee consists of the President and a Vice-President of IAHS and representatives of UNESCO and WMO.

Two medals are awarded under the International Hydrology Prize: the Dooge medal and the Volker medal. Both medals are intended to distinguish outstanding achievements by hydrological scientists but with a different focus. The Dooge medal is aimed at fundamental contributions to the science of hydrology, whereas the Volker medal is aimed at outstanding applications of hydrological science for the benefit of society at large.

This year the traditional IAHS Frisbee game was held on a sandy Port Elizabeth beach. The game opposed the stationary ungauged hydrologists (SUHs) to the nonstationary gauged hydrologists (SGHs), being a perfect mix of the two PUB (SUHs team) and Panta Rhei (SGHs team) decades’ researchers.

The first ten minutes of the game were heavily disputed between the two teams. Some time was indeed necessary to adapt to the unusual sandy and windy terrain conditions, as well as to the salty water. The SGHs team fast developed a stochastic model that could adapt to the wind gusts, as well as to the drop of wind, to dry and wet sandy land use, and to the rising Indian Ocean tide and even to waves. They consequently scored first, taking advantage of the changing conditions, which they are used to. This resulted into a fast growing score, up to 6-0 for SGHs.

Over confident with their score advantage, the Panta Rhei SHGs team decided that they had to also take advantage of their moto: “Everything flows”, which in that case was adapted to “Everything floats”. For this reason, they decided to throw the Frisbee into the ocean. To their surprise, Frisbees do not float very well and the one they threw disappeared, so the players had to use a new one.

The SUHs team, oppositely to the over-calibrated SGHs team, did not need calibration for this new Frisbee, so they began to score their first points: 6-2. However, the original Frisbee reappeared from the water and with this well-known Frisbee, the score went fast to 11-2 for the SGHs team.

It was time for the golden Frisbee, i.e. the last point that would decide upon the winners of the game. Again, the SUHs did not need calibration for this new rule and they scored fast, putting an end to this pleasant game, with a score of 11-3.

This e-news brings you the latest news from Panta Rhei at the IAHS Port Elizabeth Assembly.

New Panta Rhei Biennium 2017 – 2019

We are very pleased to announce that the IAHS Bureau has voted to accept the handover of the Panta Rhei leadership from the 2015 – 2017 Biennium to the 2017 – 2019 Biennium. This announcement was made to the participants of the IAHS Scientific Assembly in Port Elizabeth (South Africa) during the Plenary on 13 July. The new Panta Rhei leadership is as follows:

Panta Rhei Chair 2017-2019:

· Giuliano di Baldassarre, Uppsala University, Sweden

Leadership Team 2017-2019:

· Veena Srinivasan, Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and the Environment, Bangalore

· Fuqiang Tian, Tsinghua University, Beijing

· Yasir Mohamed, UNESCO IHE, Netherlands

· Tobias Krueger, Humboldt University of Berlin, Germany

· Junguo Liu, South University of Science and Technology of China

· Amir AghaKouchack, University of California, Irvine, USA

· Heidi Kreibich, Helmholtz Centre Potsdam, Germany

· Tara Troy, Lehigh University, USA

Panta Rhei Meeting at Port Elizabeth

A Panta Rhei meeting took place on Wednesday 12 July at the IAHS 2017. The meeting was chaired by Giuliano Di Baldassarre. Hubert Savenjie introduced the event, which was then followed by three brief talks and a 45-minute debate.

Alberto Montanari summarized the origins of Panta Rhei and the overarching research questions, Berit Arhemeir presented the potential of SWITCH-ON Virtual Water Science Lab IT to support scientific collaboration, and Junguo Liu showed some of the most recent activities with a focus on developing countries.

An open discussion was then facilitated by Giuliano Di Baldassarre. The debate aimed to get feedback on ongoing and future activities, and keep shaping together the Panta Rhei research agenda. There was a general consensus on the need to produce open databases and tools, support cooperation within the IAHS community, keep the focus on early career scientists, and connect with other research communities, including human geographers, behavioral economists, sociologists and political scientists. Various challenges were also discussed. Scientific challenges, such as the understanding of hydrological change in the Anthropocene, whereby humans are key drivers of change, and methodological challenges, including both opportunities and difficulties in collaborating and engaging with social scientists.

Panta Rhei and SWITCH-ON

A new partnership between Panta Rhei and the SWITCH-ON Virtual Water Science Lab, which we hope will assist Panta Rhei working groups to participate in joint projects. This new tool is launched at the IAHS website for data sharing and collaborative experiments: http://www.switch-on-vwsl.eu/

Each working group can start thematic discussions in the Forum and also create protocols. The VWSL aims to facilitate collaboration despite of geographical distances, as well as transparency of computational workflows. We hope that these tools will serve the IAHS community to advance science and comparative hydrology through more efficient collaboration across the globe. The SWITCH-ON Virtual Water-Science Laboratory was demonstrated in the Poster Hall every day during coffee breaks and poster sessions at the IAHS 2017.

Panta Rhei Activities 2016 – 2017

Panta Rhei had a busy year during 2016 – 2017. One new working group was formed, “Comparative Study on the Co-Evolution of Coupled Human-Water Systems”, bringing the total number of groups to 32 (with a total of more than 400 members).

Panta Rhei is creating an online map with overview information of working group projects and Panta Rhei members. Watch this space as we hope to release the first version by the end of 2017. We continue our ongoing opinion paper series in Hydrological Sciences Journal: you can find more information about the series here: https://iahs.info/News.do?news_id=201 .

Panta Rhei has organised conference sessions at EGU, AGU, and workshops in UK and China. The upcoming 2nd IAHS Panta Rhei International Workshop will be held in Iran in November.

For more details on all these activities will soon be available in the Panta Rhei annual report.

IAHS are pleased to announce that the SWITCH-ON Virtual Water-Science Lab. is now available through the IAHS website (in the Panta Rhei section and the Links page). This Lab was developed by a group of IAHS researchers and will be demonstrated during the whole week of the IAHS 2017 Scientific Assembly in Port Elizabeth in July 2017 in the poster section of room B2. The project phase is ending and the Lab is now offered as a tool for the IAHS community and the working groups of Panta Rhei.

SWITCH-ON is an EU-funded FP7 project with 15 partners across Europe (duration 2013 - 2017, grant agreement no. 603587). One main focus is share data, tools and computational scripts between scientists and research groups world-wide. The Lab also enable transparency and reproducibility of scientific experiments.

Suggestions for improvement to the Lab with the inclusion of more tools are highly appreciated. Please contact Berit Arheimer or Lorna Little.

About VWSL

Why use the Virtual Water Science Laboratory (VWSL) ?

The VWSL should facilitate collaboration and support reproducible experiments in water research. The goal is to overcome geographical distance for comparative hydrology and increase transparency when using computational tools in hydrological sciences. The VWSL gives access to open data through dedicated software tools for data search and upload, and helps creating protocols for joint experiments in the virtual environment. The SWITCH-ON VWSL will help you as a scientist with:

Cooperation around the world - helps you to connect with other scientists in comparative analyses and collaboration, as a mean to accelerate scientific advance in your research field.

Repeatability* of experiments – enables thorough review of a large variety of numerical experiments, which is a foundational principle in scientific research and will raise your standards.

New forms of scientific research – by using online ‘living’ protocols you can elaborate ideas incrementally with a large group of colleagues and share data, tools, models, etc. in open science.

The Second IAHS Panta Rhei International Workshop on

Water System Knowledge Innovation and its Practices in Developing Countries

November 20-22, 2017Gorgan, Iran

The four main objectives for this workshop are:

(1) To understand major water system problems and their root causes particularly in developing countries in coupled nature-human systems;

(2) To demonstrate current hydrological knowledge of models, tools and case studies to deal with water system problems e.g. water scarcity, water-related disasters, groundwater depletion, water-related poverty and conflicts;

(3) To identify demand for hydrological innovation to meet the grand water system challenges particularly IWM under the severe climate change conditions as well as under unstable policy and management conditions; and

(4) To develop a multi-national and multi-disciplinary cooperation framework with a concrete working plan in order to provide capacity building, monitoring equipment, and free software packages and decision support systems for developing countries, and to expand Panta Rhei as well as IAHS through establishing national committees and regional networks and increasing members in these counties.

Selecting Measures and Designing Strategies for Integrated Flood Management.A new guidance document has been developed to support the design of well-balanced strategies for Integrated Flood Management. “This guidance document serves as the operational link between the policy and tool papers previously published by the Associated Programme on Flood Management (APFM),” said Johannes Cullman, Director of the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) Climate and Water Department.

Herewith an update to assist you with preparations for the IAHS 2017 Scientific Assembly in South Africa in July.

• The programme is close to being finalised. You have already received information on the acceptance of your paper or poster. Confirmation of your presentation date and time will be sent soon. Meanwhile, an overview of the programme is available on the conference web site at http://cwrr.ukzn.ac.za/iahs/session-programme

• The past few weeks have been very busy for many hydrologists with meetings such as EGU etc. taking place. Given these activities, we have taken the decision to extend the early bird registration toMay 15.

• The Boardwalk Hotel, hosting the conference, has released a number of rooms at a low rate. Please contact them directly to take advantage of this opportunity. Details are on the conference web site.

• The assessment of the Young Water Scientists support applications is ongoing and will be finalised in the next week or so. It is too late to apply for financial support now.

• We are planning to hold a group dinner on the beach on Thursday evening i.e.July 13. Registration and payment for the dinner will be done when you register on site in July. The international frisbee competition will precede this.

• More detailed information on local issues, such currency, electrical sockets, cell phone coverage, sim cards, security, health care etc. will be posted on the conference web site next week.

IAHS are pleased to announce the recipients of the International Hydrology Prize (Dooge medal and Volker medal) for 2017.

The award ceremony will be held on July 13th during the IAHS Scientific Assembly in Port Elizabeth, South Africa.

The 2017 recipients of the IAHS-UNESCO-WMO International Hydrology Prize are:

- Zbyszek Kundzewicz, Poland, Dooge medal for his outstanding contributions to an improved understanding of flood events, climate impact on water resources and his leadership in the international community of hydrologists.

- Dan Rosbjerg, Denmark, Volker medal for outstanding scientific achievements within hydrology and water resources, his life-long dedication and service to IAHS and his contributions to IHP

Nominations for the Prize are made by National Committees to IAHS, National Committees to the UNESCO-IHP or National Hydrological Advisors to the WMO, and forwarded to the Secretary General of IAHS for consideration by the Nomination Committee. The Committee consists of the President and a Vice-President of IAHS and representatives of UNESCO and WMO.

As of 2014, two medals are awarded under the International Hydrology Prize: the Dooge medal and the Volker medal. Both medals are intended to distinguish outstanding achievements by hydrological scientists but with a different focus. The Dooge medal is aimed at fundamental contributions to the science of hydrology, whereas the Volker medal is aimed at outstanding applications of hydrological science for the benefit of society at large.

The new edition of the World Water Development Report 2017, titled “Wastewater, The Untapped Resource”, is published today during the celebrations of World Water Day in Durban, South Africa. Watch the event in live streaming: https://www.facebook.com/UnitedNationsWater/

The award will be conferred during the IAHS 2017 Scientific Assembly in Port Elizabeth, South Africa in July 2017.

The IAHS Tison Award, established in 1982, aims to promote excellence in research by young hydrologists. The Award is granted for an outstanding paper published by IAHS in a period of two years previous to the deadline for nominations.

Four years after the successful completion of IAHS Predictions in Ungauged Basins (PUB) initiative, its high impact continues with publication of the Chinese translation of the Cambridge University monograph, Runoff Predictions in Ungauged Basins: Synthesis across Processes, Places and Scales (G. Blöschl, M. Sivapalan, T. Wagener, A. Viglione and H. H. G. Savenije, Editors, 2013).

This is a simplified Chinese translation produced by a team of hydrologists at Tsinghua University, Beijing, led by Professor Fuqiang Tian. The softcover edition is published by China Water & Power Press, in partnership with Cambridge University Press. More information is available fromhttp://eng.waterpub.com.cn/products/publication/books/302.html

This Simplified Chinese Translation is authorised for sale in the People’s Republic of China (excluding Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan) only.

UNESCO may cover the abstract processing charge for applicants for Session #26 upon request and pre-submission of the abstract to Renée Gift (r.gift@unesco.org) and Nicole Webley (n.webley@unesco.org), with priority given to students as well as individuals from developing and least developed countries.

Please note that PIAHS volumes for sessions #1 and #16 will be post-published.

We recently started the Panta Rhei opinion paper series. The purpose of the series is to enrich and improve the Panta Rhei approach via diverse, critical and constructive opinions. For this, we have identified key questions and topics for debate, which will be covered by invited opinion papers over the course of the next two years.

Additionally, we want to motivate a scientific discussion in response to the contributions and topics presented. We sincerely hope for your engagement in this scientific debate. Please contribute your ideas or critique on the opinion papers by writing and submitting your commentary within six months from their online publication. Once the commentary is deemed suitable for publication, the authors of the original opinion paper will be invited to submit a 'Reply to commentary' so that the two (or more) contributions to the formal scientific discussion can be published together in a later issue of the Hydrological Sciences Journal.

The Kruger National Park is South Africa’s flagship conservation area where 2 million hectares of unrivalled diversity of life forms fuses with historical and archaeological sites, in a semi-arid savanna landscape. The KNP offers a wildlife experience that ranks as one of the best in Africa. The KNP has also had a long history of freshwater management and research on both aquatic and terrestrial ecosystem, which includes some long running water resources management and hydrological studies. This technical tour will allow the participants to get out into the bush, with a chance to see some of the Big 5 whilst visiting some of the long term hydrological monitoring sites. Space is limited, so please register your interest as soon as possible at http://cwrr.ukzn.ac.za/iahs/programme-of-activities

The Kruger National Park is South Africa’s flagship conservation area where 2 million hectares of unrivalled diversity of life forms fuses with historical and archaeological sites, in a semi-arid savanna landscape. The KNP offers a wildlife experience that ranks as one of the best in Africa. The KNP has also had a long history of freshwater management and research on both aquatic and terrestrial ecosystem, which includes some long running water resources management and hydrological studies. This technical tour will allow the participants to get out into the bush, with a chance to see some of the Big 5 whilst visiting some of the long term hydrological monitoring sites. Space is limited, so please register your interest as soon as possible at http://cwrr.ukzn.ac.za/iahs/programme-of-activities

Scientific programme of the IAHS Scientific Assembly

#1 Water security and the food-water-energy nexus: drivers, responses and feedbacks at local to global scales (to be post-published as a PIAHS volume)#2 Hydrology and the Anthropocene#3 Understanding spatio-temporal variability of water resources and the implications for IWRM in the semi-arid east and southern Africa#4 Water Balance and Crop Water Productivity in Sub-Saharan Africa Agricultural Watersheds#5 Land use change impacts on water resources#6 Water resources management and the competition/balance between humans and ecosystems (eco-hydrology)#7 Measurements in the 21st century: innovation in hydrological observations#8 Environmental and artificial tracers as indicators in hydrology#9 Innovative ICT tools for water management and science#10 Prediction in ungauged basins#11 Modelling hydrological processes for prediction under change#12 Probabilistic forecasts and land-atmosphere interactions to advance hydrological predictions#13 Extreme events: links between science and practice#14 Advances in cold-region hydrological models: Integration of process understanding and application to climate and landcover changes#15 Operational snowmelt runoff modelling: Advances and prospects for water management#16 Water quality and sediment transport issues in surface water (to be post-published as a PIAHS volume)#17 Long-term evolution in catchment water quality#18 Changing biogeochemistry of aquatic systems in the Anthropocene: inter-comparison of data and models for predicting water quality#19 Advancements in modeling and characterization of aquifer#20 Methodologies for risk assessment of groundwater contamination#21 Quantifying uncertainty in hydrological systems: A Bayesian point of view#22 Nonstationarity in Hydrology: Theories, Methods and Applications#23 Multivariate statistics for hydrological application#24 Stochastic hydrology: simulation and disaggregation models#25 Graduate Schools in Water Sciences#26 Facilitating Scientific contributions in water diplomacy and cooperation processes

The annual subscription is now due for Volume 62 (2017) of HSJ. Volume 62 remains at 16 issues but we have managed to keep the subscription rate the same as in 2014. Volume 62 will contain a special series of invited opinion papers directly linked to the IAHS "Panta Rhei" initiative has also been launched in HSJ, coordinated by associate editor Heidi Kreibich.

The number of Co-editors of HSJ was increased to four at the IAHS Bureau meeting following the Kovacs Colloquium in June 2016. Ross Woods joins Demetris Koutsoyiannis, Mike Acreman and Attilio Castellarin.

Special journal subscription rates are available to IAHS Members: £27.00 for a personal online subscription, and £48.00 for a personal online + print subscription (£32.40 and £53.40, respectively for EU members, inclusive of VAT).